


And Circumstance

by lookninjas



Series: Children's Work [21]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-08 09:49:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13455708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lookninjas/pseuds/lookninjas
Summary: Rey graduates.  Ben is a mess.





	And Circumstance

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt: "If you're still doing Michigan AU prompts: Ben at any of Rey's graduations (middle school, high school, college)." I chose high school as that seems the biggest of her graduations thus far.
> 
> Also, since this has at least gotten me writing again: If anyone else has a prompt, lookninjas.tumblr.com

He’s still leaking tears as he hurries down the bleachers, shouldering his way through the crowd, muttering apologies but not able to stop himself, not able to slow down, eyes fixed on the gold glitter M so neatly traced out on the blue felt glued to Rey’s cap. He dodges someone’s grandmother, a couple of strollers, pauses only briefly when Rey’s track coach pats him on the shoulder to reply to her “Congratulations!” with a quick “Yeah, thanks, it’s – Excuse me,” and then it’s onto the green grass of the football field, trying his best not to flatten any teenagers on his way through the crowd. They’re great, they’re all great, and he’d love to stop and congratulate a few of them, but –

_My name is Ray-of-Sunshine Plutt, and I am not supposed to be standing here right now._

One of Rey’s friends spots him as he hurries over and there’s an “Uh-oh,” and an “Incoming” and they scatter in a flutter of white robes as Rey turns bright eyes to his, grinning ear-to-ear, and he scoops her up, spins her around just to hear her laughter, the girls around her laughing too, and then he can’t put her down again right away so he just holds her there, one of her arms around his neck, his face buried in the shoulder of her robe, and he’s still crying, still cannot seem to stop. 

_We are here, all of us, because someone somewhere along the line saw the potential for us to be more._

“Ben?” 

Reluctant, he lets her slip free, back down to her feet. He can’t quite let go, keeps one hand on her shoulder, and she stares up at him, one hand on his face, thumbing a tear away.

“Really?” she says, still glowing, still almost grinning. "That bad?“

"I don’t think he’s crying because it was ‘bad.’” Someone’s mother – Florence’s, he thinks; he doesn’t know Rey’s friends’ parents as well as he used to, but he sees them around – nudges her way through the crowd. She pulls a half-empty packet of tissues out of her camera bag (she always has that camera bag, he remembers), holds it out to Ben with a smile. He nods, grateful, takes it. She pats him on the shoulder. "You deserved every word of that, you know,“ she adds, and Ben musters a smile and a nod, although he knows he didn’t, really.

_I’d like us all to take a moment, now, and be grateful for those people. For the ones who got us here._

He wipes his eyes and tries to keep smiling, and Florence’s mother (or possibly grandmother, now that he’s thinking about it) pats him again and says, "I wanted to get a picture of you two, but. Maybe later.”

Then she’s moving on, and the other girls are fluttering away, laughing, taking poses for the camera, and it’s just Ben and Rey, in a sea of other people.

She takes the tissues from him, starts blotting his face. "Poe told me you’d be a mess,“ she says. "I mean, I didn’t really doubt him, but. It’s true, though. I really wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you. And I just – I guess I just wanted to say it. Once. In front of a big crowd of people. It looked pretty full up there. How many do you think it was, three hundred, maybe four? I mean, there’s only ninety of us, but when you factor in parents and siblings and grandparents and maybe aunts and uncles and –”

“Oh my God, Rey,” he manages, finally, and half-heartedly tries to push her hand away but she doesn’t budge. She doesn’t budge a lot, as a general rule. It’s one of the best things about her. "I didn’t do your homework for you. I didn’t – I got you into school. You did the rest. Everything else, all of that, that was all you. I just –“

_But I thought about that little girl I’d been, and how much she would’ve wanted this. And I thought about my brother, about Ben, and everything he’d given up so I could have it, and I –_

"You suck,” he says, finally, and she laughs and drags him down into another hug. 

“You started it,” she says, and then turns her face into his neck, clutches him tighter, and adds, “We did it, Ben. You and me. We did it.”

_Whatever you had to conquer to get here, whatever stood in your way, congratulations. You did it. You got there. We, all of us, got here. And we’re going to keep moving forward, no matter what._

“We did it,” he echoes, and clutches her close, still crying a little, but that’s okay.

They did it.


End file.
